For Jenn's Mama and Janet Riehl

Here are the Scottsdale boots, JM. I love the stitching on the toe (which matches my dress) and note; pegged soles!

Janet Riehl (see her blog www.riehlife.com) asked about Ucross. To go on a writer's residency at the Ucross Foundation is like heading to heaven to write. It is beautiful. A working ranch out by the Powder River Breaks with big sky, and not only ranch animals to paint thumbnails of in one's journal (I've got a notebook full of these) but lots of other fauna as well...including fawns, though in Nov, when I went, they're hardly fawns anymore.

Ucross provides their prose writers, poets, filmakers, screenwriters, ceramicists, painters, bookartists, woodworkers (etc) with a beautiful place to sleep (private rooms) a place to work (I had an office downstairs from my bedroom with windows on three sides, bookcase, desk, chairs, couch) and GREAT meals.

One of my favorite parts of the day was just before noon when a sack lunch (and what a sack lunch!) was delivered outside my door. There was no knock, no call because at Ucross everyone is VERY careful to allow the people to work, careful about privacy, noise, needs...
All the artists at Ucross met for dinner. The chef (I hope Ruthie is still there) provided a fantastic meal which was enjoyed amidst lots of laughter and conversations. The artists washed up afterwards and then either went back to their offices to work or had a drink and played pool, watched TV, checked their e-mail, made phone calls. I heartily recommend applying for a residency if you can manage it at all, for on top of the good food, the artists, the digs, I also got a huge amount of work done on Turpentine, the novel that was published a little less than a year ago.

JACKALOPE! FRIES! Douglas, Wyoming.

After Scottsdale we headed toward Wyoming. When we got to Douglas I told Sam and Louis about "The Koop" where my mom had eaten as a kid when Bert would take her from the ranch into town. They had fries made from one continuous line of potato swiveled off the potato with a gadget and thrown into the deep fryer. After my mom grew up, had us, she took us there as well and we were amazed at the fries.
Louis and Sam and I drove into town, and there is was, THE KOOP. We went in and, alas, they were closing, but they assured me that yes, they still had those continuous fries.


Douglas also still has a giant jackalope.

SCOTTSDALE-I GOT NEW (OLD) BOOTS!

Here I am at the Mass booksigning in Scottsdale. What you can't see is that I've got on a GREAT pair of boots that I purchased for a ten dollar bid at the Western Writers of America Auction. They match my dress. What a deal.

Also there-my friend Loren Estleman signing his new book, "Gas City"-

-the wonderful Louis Warren (I got to sit by him because our names both start with W!) with his book, "Buffalo Bill's America"- Beside him (and beside me when I was sitting and not taking pictures) Max McCoy, "A Breed Apart." Max does underwater cave exploration in his non-writing time. He seemed so nice and not crazy, however, when talking to him. Go figure.

-the illustrious and prolific Johhny Boggs (Check out "The Hart Brand!")

-and my great pal, Deb Morgan (if you love mysteries and antiques, buy some of her books, "The Majolica Mysteries" available at Amazon) standing next to a smiling Tracy Hutton, wife of author/documentarian Paul Hutton. ("Phil Sheridan and his Army")

San Diego and Art

In San Diego we visited two wonderful artists, two wonderful friends, Gail Schneider and David Matlin. David is a poet and a novelist. Read "How the Night is Divided" (fiction) or "Vernooykill Creek" (Nonfiction).

Gail is a visual artist of great talent. She had a show at Soka University in Aliso Viejo. This is one of my favorite pieces, cast in concrete and polished.

This is another gorgeous head, glazed in terra sigalata, and raku fired.

I keep a close watch...Johnny's Star

Before leaving LA, we took a trip to Hollywood to meet friends for lunch. Walking to the restaurant I looked down and saw stars. Somehow I always expect the stars to be...showier, cleaner, maybe with a few actors milling around to give autographs. Instead there they are in a sidewalk. Being stepped on. Gum and grime abound, there are chips out of the sidewalk. Some of the stars are blank as if there is no more talent to fill them. I was glad to see Johnny Cash's star. He is someone who made art early, and continued to make art all the way to the end. I very much like his last album and it gives me hope that there is time to make things no matter the age.

Urban River, LA Style

The first stop on our trip was LA where we have a friend who is wildly talented and does fascinating things like write books (FLIGHT MAPS by Jenny Price) and give tours of the LA River to people like me who wondered why they had never seen the river if it runs right through LA. Well, because it is hurried elsewhere, run along concrete causeways where it often disappears to nothing, and dumped into the ocean.

Parts of the River, however, look downright idyllic. One would think they were in the country considering the reeds and the ducks, the egrets, the soft rush of water. However if you look up, there's LA screaming along the banks, across the bridges.



Much of the river looks nothing like a river. Concrete pylons and walls enclose the river so that it looks more like run-off than anything.

It is a good place to shoot a movie, however. See Chinatown, Grease.

And, man, some of the tagging is gorgeous.

I'm back and you didn't even know I left

One of the first things I did when we got home is give the guys haircuts. Not that I minded their long hair, I liked it. It is summertime,however, and they wanted short hair. So, I got out the scissors, the clippers, and cleaned them up, leaving enough hair on the floor to manufacture a cat.

Where were we? Three thousand miles worth of away. Penultimate destination-North Dakota. The new novel (full draft is finished!) required a visit. But I'll get to that later. As I said before, it is summertime, a period of travel, so I might just make this trip last for a month of blogging. First stop-the LA River.